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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (446263)	8/21/2003 3:58:39 PM
From: cnyndwllr	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

Neo, re: >>"We are killing, imprisoning, and disarming members of the resistance every day. If they are a small enough number, than eventually resistance will become little more than a nuisance, if it continues at all."<< On the surface that logic has a certain appeal. It does not, however, consider the complexities of the situation and take into account human nature. In the real world the law of unintended consequences will, I believe, reveal that the opposite is true. For instance the "killing, imprisonment and disarming [of] members of the resistance" would seem to reduce their numbers. But IF a number of those that were killed, imprisoned or disarmed were NOT GUERRILLAS but rather non-guerrillas, then you might be CREATING guerrillas among them, their family members, their friends and those that saw the killing, imprisonment and disarming as unjust and heavy handed. One thing that we have proven over and over again, is that we cannot even identify the bad guys in our own culture and who speak our own language. What do you think the odds are that in the chaos that is Iraq we are able to even come close to accurately identifying those that are guerrillas. More likely we are settling scores for those that have long standing hatreds, grudges and personal axes to grind. Broad stroked repressive methods of dealing with guerrilla movements are almost always counter productive unless they are unspeakably brutal. Guerrrilla resistance is not a static state. In order to predict the scope and staying power of the resistance you have to make certain assumptions about the ideological and practical bases for the resistance and you have to use that information to carefully analyze the impact of steps that are taken for the PURPOSE of quashing the resistance. Reality rarely parallels the obvious.